Notions Quotations

I didn't read much SF as a kid - I was a total Tolkien geek - but I started reading Samuel Delany and Angela Carter and Ursula LeGuin in high school, and I was definitely taken with the notion that here was a literature that could explore various notions of gender identity and how it affects the culture at large.

Freedom is a human concept. We have these very romanticized, sentimentalized notions of freedom. And for species - monkeys and other creatures - freedom is a pretty risky, complex proposition that's not always for their benefit.

I don't know about you, but I find it exhilarating to see how vague psychological notions evaporate and give rise to a physical, mechanistic understanding of the mind, even if it's the mind of the fly.

The Malays have many queer notions about tigers and usually only speak of them in whispers, because they think that certain souls of human beings who have departed this life have taken up their abode in these beasts, and in some places, for this reason, they will not kill a tiger unless he commits some specially bad aggression.

'Rhye' clearly plays with notions of sexual identity, and it has made a concerted effort to keep its own identity mysterious. Its love songs are gender-neutral, the members have declined to appear in their own videos, and you'd be hard-pressed to find a photo of the duo that doesn't cast them in shadows.

If we are honest with ourselves, we have to admit that sometimes our assumptions and preconceived notions are wrong, and therefore, our interpretation of events is incorrect. This causes us to overreact, to take things personally, or to judge people unfairly.

'Crash' is a movie about the racial tension that still exists in America. A lot of us pretend that we don't have preconceived notions and stereotypical ideals about each other, but we do. And we wanted to create a movie about people whose lives crash into each others' accidentally.

As a member of this court I am not justified in writing my private notions of policy into the Constitution, no matter how deeply I may cherish them or how mischievous I may deem their disregard.

There came a time when these two incompatible notions of who I was, well, something had to give. Either that 'something' is where you acquiesce to the world around you and you conform, or you sort of defiantly break whatever remaining bonds connect you to that world and create for yourself a different set of values.

So, while I gave up the notions of publishing at that time, I never stopped editing and refining that book. A few years later, in 1987, I thought I had it ready to go out again.

The common Notions of Liberty are not from School Divines, but from Nature.

We are people, individuals comprising a variety of sexes, races, shifting sexualities and all the rest of it. Every convention that tries to reinforce this difference is a step back. Notions of gender pointlessly separate men from women, but also mothers from daughters and fathers from sons.

I think the expectation of me was that I'd grow up, get married, have a family, probably not even have a job outside the home. I had bold notions sometime in my childhood that I wanted to be veterinarian... I wasn't sure I'd ever do it.

I am always revolted when Islamic leaders, from Afghanistan or elsewhere, deny the very existence of female oppression, avoid the issue by pointing to examples of what they view as Western mistreatment of women, or even worse, justify the oppression of women on the basis of notions derived from Sharia law.

The conventional notions of art have changed, and a lot of things done today are considered works of art that would have been rejected in the past.

It is odd what notions men seem to have of the scantiness of a woman's resources. They do not find it anything out of nature that they should be able to exist by themselves; but a woman must always be borne about on somebody's shoulders, and dandled or chirped to, or it is supposed she will fall into the blackest melancholy!

Going to war is a rare experience in American culture, so it's easy for simple notions to gain a lot of weight. The reality is always more complex.

When I left Toronto and entered journalism in the late 1990s, I had many notions about the news business, nearly all of them wrong, as it turned out.

In Sufi terms, there are two very interesting notions of transcendence. One is to gaze out at the universe and to comprehend that what you see out there reflects what you are. The other one is to look inside yourself and recognise that the universe is present there.

I had a lot of romantic notions about what it would mean to cross Asia by foot.

But ultimately what I was impressed by during my years in government was how much the intellectual climate and the prevailing intellectual notions constrained and represented the universe within which the discourse took place.

When I used to say I wanted to play at Wimbledon, they used to laugh in my face and say, 'What are you talking about, you're from Hyderabad, and you're supposed to... cook.' That's one of the notions that people have in this side of the world - it is our 'culture', within quotes, you know, to say what a woman can or cannot do.

If contemporary artists sincerely seek to be original, unique, and new, they should begin by disregarding the notions of originality, individuality, and innovation: they are the cliches of our time.

Middle English is an exciting field - almost uncharted, I begin to think, because as soon as one turns detailed personal attention on to any little corner of it, the received notions and ideas seem to crumple up and fall to pieces - as far as language goes, at any rate.

Morality is often seen as an innovation, like agriculture and writing. From this perspective, babies are pint-sized psychopaths, self-interested beings who need to be taught moral notions such as the wrongness of harming another person.

More-radical scholars insist that an inherent clash exists between science and our long-held conceptions about consciousness and moral agency: if you accept that our brains are a myriad of smaller components, you must reject such notions as character, praise, blame, and free will.

The modern tradition is the tradition of revolt. The French Revolution is still our model today: history is violent change, and this change goes by the name of progress. I do not know whether these notions really apply to art.

When men do not have healthy notions of the Divinity, false ideas supplant them, just as in bad times one uses counterfeit money when there is no good money.

Being called 'conscious' is a great thing to be, but it's the connotations and preconceived notions that come with the buying audience about what conscious music can be.

When I wrote 'The Rozabal Line,' I had no preconceived notions of what a commercial bestseller should be. I have always viewed 'The Rozabal Line' as my first love and probably my best work. The fact, however, is that it is my least read work.

The Republican Party needs to, first of all, quit electing people in primaries that have prehistoric notions about women's issues.

Shun no toil to make yourself remarkable by some talent or other; yet do not devote yourself to one branch exclusively. Strive to get clear notions about all. Give up no science entirely; for science is but one.

We've got a new coach in Mike Babcock, who has no preconceived notions about either guy. They're both in their early 30s and they both are on one-year contracts, so I expect a healthy competition and I hope in the end the team is the benefactor.

We want our music and ideas to be in the forefront, and what we learned permeated our thinking. Notions of film and architecture feed what we see in our minds as we make music.

There are plenty of writers, past and present, from Shakespeare to Henry James to Lydia Davis, who test the limits of coherence and put pressure on current notions of accessible (and acceptable) narrative methods. To thrive and change and grow, any art needs this kind of pressure.

We had no preconceived notions of what we were going to be,

When the second season rolls around, you throw the records out. If you have too many preconceived notions about your opponent, you can get your butt kicked real quick.

Let us turn these notions of ordinances into programs for services that will actually address the problem that every American city has.

Love is the emplem of eternity; it confounds all notions of time; effaces all memory of begining, all fear of an end.

Men on their side must force themselves for a while to by their notions by and begin to familiarize themselves with facts.

My concepts are never bright ideas; they're never notions I think will sell or be trendy or attract new fans. I don't think that way. All I can do is sing from my life.

Muslim countries where notions of free expression are not as familiar -- what they see in the whole thing is the offensive cartoon to their prophet.

I don't know why we, in the art world, cannot unpack things and sort of make hybrid notions of a practice. We're very rigid. It's funny, though; in music, we have no problem sampling, mixing and remixing. But in the art world, why can't we take little parts of history and mix it together?

I feel drawn to experiment with ways that technology can interact with notions of intimacy, because so much of technology is done in a way that's very cold and has such an opposite effect.

I did not come in with preconceived notions when I came here. We went in to review what happened this season. Following the meeting, I made the decision we would not offer an extension.

I didn't have any preconceived notions that he couldn't play. When a prideful kid comes in working like crazy, he doesn't realize how much better he's gotten.

From a distance, at a time of urbanization and connectivity, rodeo and ranching may seem anachronistic notions - quaint and sepia-toned from an America that no longer exists.

What we have now is the worst of all worlds. We have the market totally in charge. It's not only a recipe for worker exploitation and depressing the wages of Americans. It's also against all of our notions of the rule of law, and basic democratic principles.

We are going to rebuild New Orleans more or less where it is, so we start out with a lot of constraints on the process, ... It is time to put a lot of interesting ideas in the hopper, but it is certainly clear that pre-conceived ideological notions ... are going to prove lacking.

Jackson was not a popular professor. He had rigid notions of discipline, and was uncompromising in his enforcement of the rules of the Institute.

It both acknowledges the generalized notions of this place, (and) it also challenges them.

Our notions of scale have been tested again and again, ... We must have transaction by transaction redundancy and reliability - and all this must happen automatically. These are big network challenges.

Nathan the Wise argues that the only way forward lies in transcending notions of separation and embracing our common humanity, both at home and abroad.

I was a purported composer with some self-taught notions about how to orchestrate for cinematic instrumentation, but no one was exactly knocking at my door. If you'd seen the apartment I was subletting at the time, you wouldn't have knocked at my door either.

We invite the lords decisively to reject the repugnant notion, offensive to all notions of human rights, that the general was entitled to immunity on the grounds that the offenses were committed in the course of official functions as head of state.

We have to just go with how he feels day-to-day. Pedro knows how to get ready, and he knows his body as well as anyone, so I didn't go in with any preconceived ideas or notions about anything. His arm is healthy, and obviously he's a little bit behind.

We have notions of blades that might be somewhat more powerful than what IBM will think about it.

We don't have preconceived notions about a team, ... That would be unfair. You call it as you see it.

This time of year, you go onto the field and know that you can go and fight for a championship. We don't have any preconceived notions out there. We're just trying to get to the playoffs. Every year, if you go out there and battle and play hard, you have an opportunity to go to the Super Bowl.

There are preconceived notions and ideas. But they may change if a guy goes out there and plays. There's a ton of examples that have changed on game day. I'm sure the people who are with us making those decisions have pretty good thoughts, but I do think this is an important game. Who can play and who can't?

There are huge segments of the audience not aware of virtualization. Some people have very naive notions about what virtualization is all about. We are planning to change that.

We tend to think that employment is employment, and we don't ask the question: is this rewarding employment? Research establishes pretty clearly that typical notions of happiness - that more is better - really don't correspond to the way people think and feel.

England set some benchmarks during the Ashes series which we can all aspire to and hopefully improve on and one of those notions is support staff around the team and we have been discussing that... the fine detail for that has yet to be worked out.

I understand people have preconceived notions of who I am or what I do. But I do find it a bit bizarre that people find it bizarre that I've grown up.

The Zippers seem to embody a lot of different notions of who they are. The CD-ROM captures that.

There will be quilts for sale, antiques for sale and the merchant mall with tons of fabrics, notions and anything a quilter could ever want.

These results do not support previous notions that a low-fat diet is the cause of the obesity epidemic. This pretty much shows that certain things we do now are healthful, such as low saturated fat intake.

The Tea Party folks may be sincere, loyal citizens, but their notions about how the economy works are exactly that: mere notions. Their core notion is that government needs to do nothing more than get out of the way of business in order for the economy to boom and bloom.

Psychology is the science of human behavior and the things that happen in the mind to create it. It's a subject that fascinates almost everyone because we all have notions of what's normal and what's not.

People had some preconceived notions about what my purpose was. Over time, being there and working with my colleagues in the Senate and the House . . . that falls away as the defining characteristic." ()

A disquieting era of genetic manipulation is coming, one that may revolutionize human capacities, and notions of health. If we treat moral scruples impatiently, as inherently retrograde in a scientifically advancing civilization, we will not be in moral trim when, soon, our very humanity depends on our being in trim.

A philosopher who adopts scientific notions predetermines his conclusions.

Anybody who comes to the show should have an open mind. It's kind of different. Take your expectations of a magic show, and forget them. This will change them. People have preconceived notions of what a magic show should be.

A president who believed that America's greatness is recoverable and expandable - a chief executive determined to lead us back to national restoration - would reject the crippling notions of national impotency that Obama has embraced.

Youngsters find that on Internet chat sites, they can talk about the most intimate of issues with total strangers - including vague notions of wanting to die.

Americans should be ashamed of how aflutter they get about Downton Abbey - it's unpatriotic. I seem to remember we fought a revolution so as not to put up with this nonsense, where notions of station are so unforgiving that upper and lower echelons are practically different species.

This moderate wage growth should dispel any notions the Fed may hold (that) labor markets and spiraling wages could reignite inflation.

This is to 'Star Search' what modern quantum physics is to Newtonian notions of physics. It's so brilliantly put together. For one thing, it's two different shows. There's the show before they pick the final 12, which is essentially a delicious reality show with lots of mocking of people, laughing at the people who are really bad and all that kind of stuff. And then it transforms after the final 12 into a really good, old-fashioned, family-friendly talent show.

There's a wide spectrum between a Navy SEAL hero-killer and a traumatized victim, but those are the archetypes - hashed and rehashed in the media, in popular culture, in the minds of people with a lot of preconceived notions but not much else.

There's always going to be that divide when it comes to pop music. Certain segments of the audience are always going to be distrustful of music that they feel is not authentic. If you get all caught up in notions of realness and authenticity, then Ashlee is going to strike you as being girlish ... and not serious.

There's always going to be that divide when it comes to pop music, ... Certain segments of the audience are always going to be distrustful of music that they feel is not authentic. If you get all caught up in notions of realness and authenticity, then Ashlee is going to strike you as being girlish... and not serious.

It seems the referees take these preconceived notions about what he's going to do. It's ridiculous some of the calls.

It's a patently unfair game that $40 million has to play against $120 million. It just violates all of our notions of fairness that money is one of the determining factors in the outcome of a sporting contest.

It's the word 'artful'; it's such a great word, with its dark and its light side, its art and its cunning, the craft and the crafty of it - I've been preoccupied with the word 'artful' and the twin notions of 'cornucopia' and 'pickpocket' it suggests for quite some time.

It's undeniable that what we are taught as a culture to believe about disability is at odds with traditional notions of masculinity.

It's important that we understand when talking about the relationship between actions of foreign policy and the notions of international law we have the sense of what actually happens practically, which is contrary to most academic views.

It's a movie, I just don't know what they're so afraid of. Whatever preconceived notions you have, you need to set them aside, the film will shatter those notions. It really isn't what people are imagining in their head. It's a lot more encompassing.

It wasn't a shortage of ideas. You could walk through NASA with double-sided sticky tape and wait 30 seconds and you've got 15 new ideas, or notions of where we should go,

I wanted to make it a really strong point to not watch 'Battlestar Galactica' before starting 'Caprica' because I was afraid it was going to give me a lot of pressure and preconceived notions of what it was going to be like.

Notions of privacy are not what we are dealing with here.

It's necessary to make the judgment calmly and objectively without any preconceived notions about whether the consumer price index excluding fresh food prices has stabilized at zero or above.

Everywhere, people are beginning to question masculine notions of control, aggression and black-and-white thinking - and instead are favoring more empathetic, nurturing and collaborative approaches.

The insistence of the Danish government to refrain from apologizing and its refusal to punish the criminals and take action to prevent this crime from being repeated... shows that the notions of freedom of speech have no roots, especially when it comes to Muslims.

I had no preconceived notions or agendas when I began this in 1993 as to what I was looking for.

Because a given era lacked a given body of information, we feel that its whole consciousness was naive. We can, therefore, sniff at, say, twelfth-century imagery of evil along with twelfth-century notions as to the shape of the solar system. The idea is that, having come upon information that supervenes the medieval cosmology, we can thereby dismiss all medieval notions as merely medieval.

He's feeling better. He feels I don't have any preconceived notions he can't play. He doesn't realize how much better he got.

Generally speaking, men are influenced by books which clarify their own thought, which express their own notions well, or which suggest to them ideas which their minds are already predisposed to accept

I can dispel one of the false notions floating around - that this country does not require foreign sources of workers. We do. The fact is our economy cannot grow without them.

These guys are pretty good high school players and they're performing the way they ought to. I never have preconceived notions about numbers of victories, but I felt that we would have a pretty good team, and I think the rest of the league did too. They voted us third, and that was an appropriate spot for us.

The findings of our studies did not fit most people's preconceived notions about how DNA molecules work, so they assumed we had to be wrong. The critics seemed very sure of themselves, and we had a lot of sleepless nights.